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When I mention capture in relation to Enterprise Content Management (ECM), most people immediately think of scanning or imaging. The reality is capture, in full and as defined in the AIIM Industry Watch titled “Document Scanning and Capture: local, central, outsource – what’s working best”, it is a combination of document scanning, image correction, recognition of text,

Barcodes, form fields, etc. and finally, output to an appropriate format for subsequent processing or archive storage.This research goes on to find that:

• 78% of those surveyed have some form of distributed scanning via MFPs, desk top scanners or branch-office scanners. Ownership of the process by the line of business owners is given as the main advantage, as well as improved utilization of MFPs.
• 46% of users report ROIs within 12 months, with two-thirds seeing returns within 18 months. These are consistent across many types of content and process, with invoices, contracts and application forms being the most popular.
• 48% of respondents have a centralized, in-house scanning service, citing better indexing and closer integration with the process as the main benefits
• Knowledge management in the form of improved searchability of business documents is the highest driver for scanning, closely followed by compliance and business process improvement.
• As regards accurate recognition and capture, on average 6.5% of scanned documents are rejected at QA or require intervention.

In my view, what this shows is that capture is an important part of an ECM and must become an integral part of the overall planning and discussion for establishing and maintaining a sound ECM environment. You must assess what will be captured, how it will be captured and who will do the capture function. Will you outsource or will it all be done in house? Will you do centralized capture or decentralized and what type of device will be used? What about recognition, will you leverage recognition technologies to aid in the capture of metadata?

There are many sides to capture beyond the conceptual imaging or capture perceptions. The key is to prepare and take the appropriate steps to ensure maximum benefit is achieved. If you are not sure where to begin, seek training from a professional association like AIIM or get professional assistance from a qualified consultant. The idea of capture is to preserve and protect your business information in the best possible way. Be an organization capable of realizing ROI within 12 months. Train. Plan. Act. Begin formulating your capture strategy today.

What say you? Do you have a story to tell? What are your thoughts on this topic? What is on your mind? Do you have a topic of interest you would like discussed in this forum? Let me know.

Bob Larrivee, Director and Industry Advisor – AIIM

Email me: blarrivee@aiim.org   

Follow me on Twitter – @BobLarrivee

www.aiim.org/training